Considering that Amazon has the proven capability of removing a book
from your Kindle after you've bought it, I don't expect that I'll EVER
decide to invest in a Kindle. Some other e-book reader is a
possibility. The Nook has certain interesting features, and there's one
that would be a good choice if it weren't twice as expensive as the
competition.
But until I feel safe investing in an e-book reader, I don't expect to
buy one. (And invest is the term. It's not so much the cost of the
reader, as the cost of the things read...that can't easily and reliably
be either read or transferred to another reader.)
On 06/19/2011 06:57 PM, Walter Bright wrote:
On 6/19/2011 2:18 PM, Jonathan M Davis wrote:
On 2011-06-19 13:26, Walter Bright wrote:
I just bought a Kindle and I'm running my unread paperbacks through the
scanner and then trashing them!
I _much_ prefer reading actual, solid, paper books. I don't
particularly like
reading books in electronic form at all. It works well for
documentation and
searchability, but beyond that, I don't see it as an advantage at all.
And in
those cases, I'd be reading them on the computer, not an e-book
reader. And of
course, then there's the issue of DRM and all that....
So, I don't own an e-book reader and I hope that e-books never become so
prominent that I'm forced to.
Your last sentence is interesting. I've read many accounts by people who
had such a sentiment, and then skeptically thought they'd give an ebook
a fair try. After a year, they completely changed their minds.
Anyhow, I hear you.
I've been buying books my whole life. I have shelves creaking with them,
boxes of books in the basement, etc. They've simply become a burden. I'd
simply like to get all my information properties - pictures, books,
papers, music, movies, letters, documents - onto a disk. They'll be
always there, sorted, categorized, instantly available, weighing
nothing, and taking up no space.
The advent of enormous and cheap disks has finally made this practical.
The migration of my books to the computer has awaited an easy way to
read them. The Kindle has finally solved that problem, at least for
paperbacks. It doesn't work well for larger books (I presume the Kindle
DX will, but I think I'd prefer an ipad for large format books.)
I'm scanning my paperbacks to PDFs, and the Kindle will display them one
page image at a time. DRM is not an issue for that. After a bit of a
learning curve, I've got it where it doesn't take much time at all to
whack off the binding and run a paperback through my sheet fed scanner.
The one thing I'm not ripping are movies. Netflix has changed everything
for me. With so much available to watch, I don't care to rewatch any old
movies. There's no reason to buy, own, archive, or collect a DVD anymore.
